The tragic ballad of Ira Hayes

When Native Americans talk about troubled veterans who slipped through the cracks, they virtually always hold up one tragic example: Ira Hayes.

Like many young American Indians who enlist in the military today in search of steady paychecks and a way off impoverished reservations, the young Pima Indian joined the Marines during World War II. He soon became famous as one of six men who raised the flag on Iwo Jima. A photograph of the moment remains one of America's most poignant military icons.

After surviving the horrific Pacific Island battle that left the bulk of his infantry company dead, Hayes was summoned back to the United States to travel the country on a tour to raise money through war bonds. Though praised everywhere he went as a war hero, he was unable to deal with what he had endured in combat. He began drinking heavily, eventually drinking himself to death in 1955 on his tribe's remote Arizona reservation. He was immortalized in the folk song "The Ballad of Ira Hayes."

Today, when American Indian veterans present one another medals and honors, they often do it in Hayes' name.